Rush The Court

Last weekend was not a good weekend for John Beilein’s Michigan team. Most notable among the afflicting issues was a ground-shaking loss to NJIT, the biggest upset by point spread (NJIT was a 24.5-point underdog) in college basketball in over seven years. If that wasn’t bad enough, Oregon and Syracuse both lost convincingly at home, rendering the Wolverine’s two biggest wins of the young season that much smaller. It was about as traumatizing as a December weekend can get for a Big Ten team in the Top 25, but come Monday, it was only the pain of the weekend that was over. We found out on Tuesday night that the mini-nightmare was in fact just beginning when the Wolverines sputtered to 42 points and yet another embarrassing home loss, this time to Eastern Michigan. The second loss was the lowest point total submitted by a Michigan team since the season finale in Beilein’s first season at the helm. With many things clearly unsettled and a trip to #3 Arizona on tap for this weekend, the Wolverines find themselves at a crossroads. Will this unsightly string of four days prove to be nothing more than a surprising blip on the radar, or is it the first sign of a team incapable of matching the standard set by its recent predecessors?

At some point, personnel losses have to take their toll. In the last two offseasons, Michigan has waved goodbye to all five players who took to the Georgia Dome floor for the opening tip of the 2013 National Championship game. Trek Burke, Nik Stauskas, Tim Hardaway, Glenn Robinson, Mitch McGary: all gone, all with eligibility to spare. That gives the Wolverines more early entrants in the last two drafts than any other program in America, Kentucky included. Caris LeVert, Zak Irvin and Derrick Walton currently form a nice perimeter-based nucleus for Beilein’s squad, but there isn’t a program in America that wouldn’t feel the effect of those unplanned defections.

Of course, many of us suspected a drop-off last season after Burke and Hardaway bid adieu, but that dip never came. Things were rocky for the Wolverines in the early-going – well, rocky as in they lost games to Charlotte and Iowa State in the same week – but Beilein’s team kicked it into gear in mid-December, winning 10 straight and eight in a row in the Big Ten en route to a regular season conference title. That season arc should afford Michigan fans a bit of hope heading into the middle of this December. Beilein still has plenty of time to work his magic, and the Big Ten schedule again sets up favorably: The Wolverines draw the two worst teams in the league (Northwestern and Rutgers) twice and, despite recent events, could easily be favored in six of their first seven conference games. A potentially tricky home date with SMU lurks after the trip to the desert this weekend, but if Michigan can escape Tucson with psyche intact – yes, moral victories do exist, particularly for teams playing road games against top-three teams a week after losing to NJIT – the schedule sets up favorably for ship-righting.

So where do the Wolverines go from here? On the one hand, you have that talented trio of LeVert, Irvin and Walton. Throw in the coaching wizardry of Beilein and you would think that mixture alone would result in enough offensive efficiency to carry a good team for large stretches of time. But on the other hand, there’s an undersized and unproven frontcourt that will soon be forced to contend with a brutal Big Ten (11 teams currently in KenPom’s top-61). With Burke, Stauskas, and the rest all gone, there’s also no leader on this team, at least not yet. LeVert did everything he could to avoid that NJIT loss (32 points, four steals), but the fragility of the current situation has revealed the youth and inexperience of a team that desperately needs a voice to lead the way. It doesn’t have to come from LeVert, but if Michigan is to find their way, it must come soon.